The Shahnameh : the Persian epic in world literature
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Bibliographic Information
The Shahnameh : the Persian epic in world literature
Columbia University Press, c2019
- : cloth
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Note
Includes bibliographical references and index
Description and Table of Contents
Description
The Shahnameh, an epic poem recounting the foundation of Iran across mythical, heroic, and historical ages, is the beating heart of Persian literature and culture. Composed by Abu al-Qasem Ferdowsi over a thirty-year period and completed in the year 1010, the epic has entertained generations of readers and profoundly shaped Persian culture, society, and politics. For a millennium, Iranian and Persian-speaking people around the globe have read, memorized, discussed, performed, adapted, and loved the poem.
In this book, Hamid Dabashi brings the Shahnameh to renewed global attention, encapsulating a lifetime of learning and teaching the Persian epic for a new generation of readers. Dabashi insightfully traces the epic's history, authorship, poetic significance, complicated legacy of political uses and abuses, and enduring significance in colonial and postcolonial contexts. In addition to explaining and celebrating what makes the Shahnameh such a distinctive literary work, he also considers the poem in the context of other epics, such as the Aeneid and the Odyssey, and critical debates about the concept of world literature. Arguing that Ferdowsi's epic and its reception broached this idea long before nineteenth-century Western literary criticism, Dabashi makes a powerful case that we need to rethink the very notion of "world literature" in light of his reading of the Persian epic.
Table of Contents
Preface
Acknowledgments
Introduction
1. The Persian Epic
2. Ferdowsi the Poet
3. The Book of Kings
4. Epics and Empires
5. Empires Fall, Nations Rise
Conclusion
Notes
Index
by "Nielsen BookData"